First he used a petrol can to torch a home where he was staying in Rydal Road, Darlington, having moved there from Stockton.

After three sleepless days of amphetamine use, he set a fire in the cupboard under the stairs at 7.55am on April 25, causing an explosion and a raging fire.

The five occupants, including the 56-year-old mum who had taken him in as a friend of her son, had to batter down the front door, fleeing in terror as flames and black smoke engulfed the two-bedroom home, Teesside Crown Court heard.

Nathan Young (Image: Police Interceptors)

The owner’s Staffordshire bull terrier, Charlie, perished in the blaze, despite efforts to save him, and the home was gutted, with £20,000 of damage done.

But Young wasn’t finished, and headed to the Majestic soft play centre on Bondgate Road at about noon, where he set another fire as some 70 parents and children used the converted cinema.

He then brought the town centre to a standstill as he threw tiles and bricks from the sex shop roof at police officers and their vehicles in the street below.